


Hill Cumorah

by kla1991



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: Bed-sharing, F/F, Holiday Fic Exchange, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-26 08:26:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13231881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kla1991/pseuds/kla1991
Summary: Helena and Myka look for an artifact at the Hill Cumorah Pageant in Palmyra, New York, and have to share a bed while they're there.





	Hill Cumorah

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Hermitstull](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hermitstull/gifts).



> Written for Hermitstull for the 2017 Bering and Wells Holiday Gift Exchange.
> 
> Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by the characters herein do not necessarily reflect the views of the author.

            Helena rolled up her shirtsleeves while she and Myka waited in line at the hotel’s check-in counter, looking for any way to reduce the oppressive heat. The lobby was crowded and humid, and the constant opening and closing of the front door let in a rush of heavy summer air that breathed right down Helena’s neck. She would rather be anywhere, literally anywhere, but here.

            Myka seemed to be suffering even more. She had taken off her jacket long ago, professionalism be damned, and she was currently patting the sweat running down her neck and chest with a paper napkin from the coffee shop they’d stopped in at the airport.

            “Does this place not have air conditioning? Seriously.”

            “It broke,” the woman in front of them in line said.

            Helena took her locket off to protect it from the dampness of her own sweat, winding the chain carefully and putting it securely in her pocket. She tried to ignore the way Myka watched the motion of her hands—it didn’t, it couldn’t, mean anything. She smiled at Myka, hoping to improve the tense agent’s mood. Myka turned sharply away.

            “I’ve heard several people discussing the three people who are ill,” Helena said as they reached the front of the line at last and checked in, “but nothing we didn’t already know. They’ve been told it was heat stroke, apparently.”

            “That’s believable. Not that you’d have to sell too hard to get these people to believe.” Myka said. A middle-aged woman heard the comment and scowled.

            Myka ignored this and marched stiffly through the crowded hotel lobby. Helena followed her at a leisurely distance, admiring the way people parted around her partner as she barreled toward the elevators.

            “I can’t believe the closest hotel room is an hour out,” Myka growled when they were alone in the elevator. “We should map out routes—the hospital, the hill, the museums, all the places each of the victims has been—I don’t want to waste time driving all over rural New York without a plan.”

            “Of course, darling.”

            “Did you read the articles I sent you? The file has info about the Hill Cumorah Pageant itself, but I thought some background info on Mormons might be helpful, I mean, the artifact is probably connected to the religion somehow, so knowing what Mormons _are_ is—“

            Helena put a hand on Myka’s elbow to stop her rambling as an elderly couple joined them in the elevator. She turned her head only slightly, leaning in close to whisper in Myka’s ear, “I know what Mormons are.”

            When they’d exited the elevator, and the elderly couple was out of hearing range, Myka said, “How do you know what Mormons are?”

            “We had them in England. My grandmother met Brigham Young, the missionary, and a few of her friends converted. They left for America in the thirties and joined a wagon train to Utah. I don’t think my grandmother ever understood it; she always leaned on rationality over faith.”

            Myka smiled as she unlocked the door to their room, and suddenly they discovered why Artie had warned them so insistently to not complain to him about the sleeping arrangements—he’d been lucky indeed to find a room, any room, within an hour of the Hill Cumorah Pageant, and the room he’d found was a single.

            It was a very nice single, and Helena noticed only the barest flicker of hesitation in Myka—invisible to anyone who hadn’t studied her as devoutly as Helena had—before she pressed on, turning to the desk and unloading her files and maps. Helena set her suitcase in the corner, near a chair. She would let Myka choose which side of the bed she preferred. When she was summoned to examine the map, Helena stood with her shoulder pressed against Myka’s, and Myka leaned in to point at various locations. It was a nice desk, after all, but also a small one. They whispered, shrouded in quiet as they plotted their investigation, and the intimacy of mind meeting mind had Helena chomping at the bit, ready to begin their search. Then Myka looked up at her, so close Helena could see the layers of color and light in her eyes, and they hung there for a moment.

            Were God merciful, he would have either struck Helena down or let her fall into the beauty before her, pressing her lips to every detail of that beloved face. Her hand clenched on the surface of the desk, clinging to a restraint that was not there as the corner of Myka’s mouth lifted into a lopsided smile. And then Myka pulled suddenly away, folding the map and tucking it into her jacket pocket.

            “C’mon, let’s go!” she said, and Helena was helpless to do anything but follow her.

           

 

            Nadine Ward, age forty-six, was the third artifact victim. She lifted a cup of ice to her mouth with trembling hands.

            “I’m just so hungry,” she said. “There’s that point where you’re so hungry you can’t feel it anymore, right? I went through that and came out the other side feeling like my stomach was eating itself, I’m so hungry.”

            Myka shifted nervously, then glanced at Helena.

            “Have you tried to, you know, sate that hunger by… biting someone?”

            The cup of ice jerked violently in Nadine’s hand, and her vacant eyes focused a little more for a moment. “Do I look like Jeffrey Dahmer?”

            “No.”

            Helena reached out then, unable to contain the desperate urge to help the poor woman guide the ice to her mouth. Behind her, Myka shifted, shaking off the memory of her past zombification, no doubt.

            “Have they not brought you any real food?” she asked.

            “They put me on an IV drip because they couldn’t get sugar in me fast enough by mouth.”

            “And you’re still feeling sick?”

            “Sick and starving. Don’t forget the starving part.”

            “This started while you were rehearsing for the Pageant, right? Were you working with Hannah Bligh or Stuart Lowell, the other people who are sick?”

            “There are almost a thousand people involved in this production. I don’t know who all of them are.”

            Nadine didn’t recognize the photos of Hannah and Stuart, either. Myka looked to Helena, confirming their next move. The connection was instant, the understanding effortless. Helena shook Nadine’s hand, said, “Thank you, we’ll leave you to rest,” and led Myka into the hospital hallway.

            “So, that didn’t give us much info. Hannah’s not accepting visitors, and her son said she’s barely talking to anyone. All we know is ‘stage hand.’ And Stuart didn’t know either of the other two victims, either.”

            Helena nodded. “Hopefully the stage manager can tell us more tomorrow. In the meantime, let’s get some food and rest ourselves, shall we? It’s late.”

 

 

            At dinner, Helena put her charm to good use, letting it flow over the wait-staff in a way she had ceased to do with Myka. Well, tried to cease, at least, for fear of revealing too much. It got her the best possible service at the restaurant. The bar tender in particular was happy to give her anything she wanted tonight, because she was the only patron that night ordering drinks—a splash of top-shelf bourbon at no extra charge was the poor man’s only hope of getting a good tip from someone. And Helena did tip well.

            Myka, it seemed, enjoyed watching Helena work her magic, the way she talked with their waitress like an old friend every time she came by to offer refills that neither of them needed. It took the edge of Myka’s terse, nervous habits as well, softening her abrupt food orders and thanks into something kinder. It thrilled Helena to her bones that she could bring out the best in Myka like this.

            Her acquiescence when Myka insisted on paying for both of them did not, she had to remind herself, make this a date, no matter how companionable the meal had been. They left together, quiet on the almost hour-long drive to their hotel, and returned to their single bed.

            Myka paused in the lobby when they got to the hotel, and she came upstairs a moment later saying, “They’re out of roll-away beds, but I’ll check again tomorrow.”

            The idea took Helena aback. Of course she was nervous about sharing a bed with Myka, but she hadn’t considered trying to avoid it. She hadn’t really wanted to, in truth—the thought of being so near to Myka, torturous as it may be, glittered with the possibility of a touch, a sleep-addled confession, a glorious second of intimacy in the dimness and warmth that might break the spell of reticence that she sometimes imagined they both were under. Clearly her imagination had gotten the best of her again tonight.

            “We don’t have to share, if you’re uncomfortable. I can sleep on the floor, or some other arrangement.” Her voice didn’t break, though she found her heart all too ready to do so.

            “What? No, that’s stupid. I mean, you’re not stupid, but that’s not my point. I just…” Myka sputtered, her mouth starting to form several words before discarding them and starting again. “Look, I move around a lot sometimes, and I know you’re not always the best sleeper. I don’t want to keep you up.”

            She was watching Helena too closely for this to be the whole truth. Helena was too relieved to push her, though, so she pretended to accept this confession at face value.

            “You’re sweet, darling, but I’m sure I’ll be fine.”

            The smile on Myka’s face was nervous but mesmerizing. Helena forced herself into the bathroom to change her clothes. When she came back, Myka had also changed and was reading one of the brochures the hotel had placed on the desk.             “Did you know that the angel who visited Joseph Smith was named Moroni? It has the word ‘moron’ right there in it. I’d think this whole religion was a prank if he hadn’t died for it.”

            “If you stay up all night researching the case, our bed-sharing issue will be solved, but I might have to go out alone tomorrow so you can get proper rest,” Helena chided, ignoring the religious commentary.

            Myka pointed a stern finger at her and said, “Yeah, _that_ is not happening. We should stick together on this one.”

            “Then you should brush your teeth and go to sleep.”

            Myka obeyed, and when she’d finished in the bathroom she flicked the light off automatically before switching it back on again.

            “Sorry! I forgot it’s supposed to stay on,” she said.

            Helena took a deep breath, loosening her sudden death grip on the bedspread, and turned to Myka.

            “You really can put the light out if it bothers you, you know. It’s foolish to—“

            “It is not foolish, it’s perfectly normal. Lots of people don’t like the dark.”

            “Children,” Helena muttered, turning her face away from Myka so she wouldn’t see the frustratedly clench her jaw.

            Myka climbed into bed then, leaning close and ducking her head to meet Helena’s eyes.

            “Hey. Not just children, and you know it. You have a right to feel safe.” She reached out, laying her hand lightly on Helena’s, and when Helena looked up at her, they were a breath away from each other. “I want you to feel safe, Helena,” Myka finished, and Helena felt the air that carried the words brush her face as it passed.

            “It’s lucky you’re here, then. I always feel safe with you.”

            Tension mounted between them, like it so often did, and Helena noted the twitch of Myka’s fingers in her hand, the furtive glance at her lips. So close, so close.

            But not close enough. Myka squeezed Helena’s hand, then settled down on her side of the bed, saying only “good night, sleep well.” Helena scolded herself for projecting her feelings, and shuffled down under the covers to shield herself from the chill of dispelled fantasies.

            The first time Myka’s foot touched her leg, Helena started, but a small shift away got her out of range. But the bed was only so large, and eventually Myka had sprawled so far across it that Helena tottered on the edge when she tried to move again. She steadied herself on the mattress while the arch of Myka’s foot settled over the curve of Helena’s calf, stroking up and down.

            Helena imagined, because it was impossible to do otherwise, what it would be like to press her back into Myka’s front, to feel this caress while Myka’s arm draped over her waist, while Helena cradled that arm close to her chest. Perhaps the motion of Myka’s foot, the rustle of her moving in the sheets, the steady whisper of her breathing, would soothe Helena to sleep instead of winding her taut like a bow string.

            Myka moved her foot just so, and touched Helena’s toes with her own. She snorted a little when she startled awake.

            “What’s the matter?” Helena asked, panicked and nearly falling off the bed again.

            Half-light from the bathroom spilled across Myka’s face. Consternation and confusion lined it. She blinked slowly, then groaned and shuffled away from Helena like a crab, muttering, “Sorry.”

            “Myka, are you alright?”

            From the depths of her pillow, Myka answered, “Your feet are cold. Why are they so cold?”

            At that, Helena laughed, reclaiming her half of the bed and settling on her back without further distress.

            “You can shove me over, you know. It won’t bother me.” Myka sounded a little more awake now, peering at Helena in the dim light.

            “I will, then.”

            “Do. I don’t want to keep you awake.”

            “You’re not, darling.”

            “Then why are you awake?”

            Helena shushed her and whispered, “Go back to sleep.”

            “What were you thinking about?” Myka asked, guessing the cause of Helena’s wakefulness.

            Of course, Helena wasn’t going to admit to anything. Instead she stared at the ceiling and asked, on a whim, “Do you believe in God?”

            Myka sat up on her elbow, looking down on Helena—Helena studiously avoided looking down her shirt.

            “No. Why?”

            “You’ve made some snide remarks about Mormons, so I wondered.”

            “Do you?”

            “I do, yes, in the way where I’ve given up on praying, but Christmas makes me sentimental. I suppose I imagine God as a benevolent creator, but not much more.” Helena sighed and chanced a look into Myka’s eyes above her. “Is ‘no’ the only answer I get from you on the topic?”

            Myka shrugged and eased back down onto the bed, laying on her back next to Helena. “I mean, I was raised Christian, sort of. We went to church on Christmas, I knew all the stories, but it wasn’t much of a commitment. In college I started really breaking down how the idea of God didn’t make sense to me, and after Sam… Anyway, the Warehouse threw a wrench in my ‘everything can be explained by science’ theory, although I guess it still might just be science that we don’t understand. That’s all magic is, right?”

            She looked over, and Helena smiled at her. Science fell short in explaining the joy that expanded in Helena’s chest in that quiet moment, no matter how many chemicals might be involved. Love was clearly greater than the sum of its biological parts.

            “What do you believe in, though? What does science _mean_ to you?”

            “Nothing. I mean, it’s an explanation for things, but it’s not a reason. Your reason to live is that it’s amazing that you get to at all. You won’t affect the universe, not in the long run, so it’s up to you, right? What do _you_ want this to mean?”

            “That could become terribly selfish as a philosophy,” Helena said.

            “Yeah. But it can also be cool to stare entropy in the face and say, ‘Hey look, I made something!’ even if it doesn’t last.”

            Helena marveled that a person could be so good and kind just because it’s what they wanted to do, and enjoyed clicking the pieces of Myka’s philosophy into her own, seeing the self-guided man as one made in her God’s own image. Beside her, Myka rolled over and was quiet, and she drifted off under Helena’s furtive, adoring glances until Helena herself fell asleep.

           

 

            Their conversation with the stage manager, early the next morning, yielded nothing. Dozens of cast and crew members were interviewed, and Hannah, Stuart, and Nadine’s lives were painted vividly by the stories Helena and Myka here, but nothing connects the three of them, and nothing points toward a specific object or even a general area.

            “If they’re not from the same place and not staying in the same hotels, then the odds are whatever’s affecting them is at one of the religious sites they visited, or at the pageant itself,” Helena surmised.

            “There are a ton of old places around here, museums and memorials. Maybe something got supercharged by all the faith the visitors bring, or the religion itself, or some other metaphysical blah-blah-blah.”

            So they wandered from Smith family’s frame home to Martin Harris’s farm, and even as far out as Peter Whitmer’s farm in the next town over, developing theories that didn’t hold much water and occasionally splashing just a little neutralizer onto things, to see if anything sparked. Nothing did. Their clothes stuck to them in the heat, and Myka’s hair in particular coiled into a tight mass that Helena simply adored. When the sun started to set late in the evening, and the pageant began, they hiked up Hill Cumorah itself, looking back on the lights and clamor of the performance below them.

            Dotted all over the hillside were long-stemmed white flowers, each blossom slightly smaller than Helena’s hand. She was too frustrated with the case, too tired and hot and in love—despite once again feeling that her sense of shared intimacy had been imagined—to hold back a risky gesture of affection. She plucked one of the flowers from its stem and offered it to Myka.

            Myka grabbed her hand, shielding it with her body and looking around as if they were being watched.

            “You’re not supposed to pick the flowers!” she whispered, but there was a fluttering undertone of laughter, as if Helena’s ignorance and mischief delighted her in spite of herself. Helena hoped, at least, that that was what Myka felt.

            “Why not?”

            “Ten thousand people come here every year, can you imagine what would happen if they were all allowed to pick stuff and take it with them? There’d be no more Sego lilies left!”

            She started them walking uphill again, and Helena almost missed the fact that of course Myka knew exactly which flower this was, because she was still holding Helena’s hand around the blossom she’d picked.

            “They’re kind of a big symbolic deal for Mormons, and it’s the state flower of Utah,” Myka explained, eager as always to share knowledge with Helena. “I read about them on the way here. The wagon trains arrived in Utah, but the pioneers’ crops got destroyed by crickets, so the Hopi taught them to eat the lily roots. They’d have starved if… Oh my god. Do you think…”

            Both of them stopped short, staring at each other in the fading daylight.

            “I doubt it’s the artifact,” Helena said, her excited breathing matching Myka’s, “but it might buy us some time.”

           

 

            Of course the hospital took some convincing, but between Helena’s persuasiveness and Myka’s brusque authority, the nurses were given permission to serve small portions of Sego lily root, traditionally prepared, to the affected patients. They didn’t recover, but they stopped loosing ground. Hungry was far better than starving. Dr. Calder stepped in to create a plausible excuse for the effect while Helena and Myka started the journey back to their hotel.

            Half an hour in, the hospital called. A fourth patient had been admitted.                                    

            Myka rolled her shoulders, trying to fight back the wave of frustration and tension. By the look of her, hunched over and scowling out the car window, she hadn’t succeeded.

            Helena glanced at her from the driver’s seat, and inspiration struck. Foolish, indulgent inspiration, but inspiration nevertheless. “I wondered if you might want to join me in the ‘hot tub’ when we return to the hotel. I’m told it’s quite relaxing.”

            She knew that she tended to pronounce some modern phrases as if they had a funny smell, and it usually made Myka laugh. Now the expression on her face, though less tense, was otherwise unreadable.

            “I uh, I didn’t bring swimwear.”

            Helena’s shoulders slumped.

            Myka added, “I guess I could throw something together, though. I have a t-shirt and some extra underwear, probably.”

            “From what I’ve observed, many women essentially wear underwear to the pool anyway,” Helena said, shooting Myka a lascivious grin.

            They changed in their room and made their way to the pool, but the noise of a dozen people splashing and shrieking in the water met them halfway. When they peeked inside the door, they found that the hot tub was occupied by five men, and the pool was full of parents and children. Helena frowned.

            “We could sit on the beach chairs and wait for a turn in the tub?” Myka offered.

            “The facility closes in an hour, and the noise level is not exactly relaxing.”

            As if to prove her point, a little kid leapt into the pool, howling, “Canonball!”

            “Are you gonna be disappointed if we don’t swim tonight?”

            “Not at all,” Helena said. “I mainly suggested it because I thought it might soothe your shoulders.”

            “Oh. That’s… that’s really sweet of you. Thanks.”

            They went upstairs and changed into pajamas. Helena emerged from the bathroom in short cotton shorts and a camisole, gently rubbing lotion onto her hands. Myka’s shoulders still ached, as well as her back and neck if the way she rubbed them and winced was any indication. Would that she would allow Helena to soothe her as Helena was doing for her own dry skin.            

            “Hey, would you be willing to do me a favor?” Myka said suddenly, and Helena was all attention. “My shoulders really are killing me, and since your hot tub idea didn’t pan out…”

            “Do you want me to run you a bath?”

            The suggestion completely deflated Myka, just the way Myka’s earlier objection to swimming had done to Helena. Under close scrutiny, she opened and closed her mouth once, then squirmed deeper into the hotel’s armchair. Helena’s face scrunched up in confusion. Were they thinking the same thing?

            She tiptoed toward that idea, murmuring, “I suppose that’s not the most efficient way to address the issue?”

            Myka clutched the back of her neck with one hand, watching Helena watch her. Helena sighed. One of them, at least, needed to stop being coy.

            “Come,” she said, perching on the bed and deciding for both of them. “Sit.”

            In Helena’s imagination, events unfolded thus: Myka sat in front of her, groaning appreciatively as Helena gripped her shoulders, massaging with certainty and care.

            “How is this?” she asked, and Myka told her to please do the same to her neck. Helena obeyed, feeling Myka’s pulse drum ever faster under her fingers as she pressed into relaxing muscles.

            There was also some tension, Myka explained, in the small of her back. Helena ran her palms up and down Myka’s spine over her t-shirt, digging in with the heels of her hands. Myka moaned. As Helena worked the muscles at the small of Myka’s back, one finger slipped, accidentally, beneath the hem of Myka’s shit, brushing burning hot skin.

            “Would it be better if I weren’t doing this through your shirt, love?” Helena whispered.

            Myka nodded, and Helena splayed her hands against Myka’s skin, hissing at the heat, the smoothness, the intimacy of the touch. Her fingers strayed around Myka’s sides as she massaged the tension-free muscles of Myka’s back. Breath shaking, Myka pulled her shirt off over her head, too desperate to keep up her pretense any longer. Helena buried her face in Myka’s hair, breathing in the faint fragrance of it, and Myka leaned back into her, guiding Helena’s hands to her naked breasts and—

            “This is really nice, thank you,” Myka said, and Helena shook off her haze.

            She managed a smile when Myka looked over her shoulder. “Glad it helped!” she replied, patting Myka’s back before moving away.

            It was almost cruel, the fact that she had to lay down and pretend that she could sleep now. Her bedmate settled easily. Perhaps there had been no pretense to her request after all.

            Helena clamped her eyes shut, determined to at least rest. She was careful to keep her restless limbs from touching Myka, but there was that foot against her ankle again, and the steady encroaching of Myka’s body onto the other side of the bed. The unconscious nearness was electric. Would she really be able to shove the sleeping woman if it came down to that?           

            And then Myka’s hand was brushing along the outside of Helena’s wrist. Curled fingers settled against Helena’s skin, pressing slightly. She turned, wanting in her hungry agony to see this meeting of bodies, just once, before reality asserted itself again. In the dim light, she saw instead a flash of green eyes, closing just an instant too late to go unnoticed.

            Myka was awake.

            The thought twisted in Helena’s gut, and she rolled toward Myka as carefully as possible, like she was approaching a strange animal in the street. Myka didn’t move away or open her eyes.

            There had been moments, in the past, when Helena had suspected that her attraction to Myka was mutual. Once the moment broke, however, she convinced herself that she’d imagined it—Myka became more businesslike, more _platonic_ , and Helena could scarcely even remember what those moments of glimmering possibility had felt like.

            Now, Helena drew one leg up until their knees brushed. Silence and stillness met the action. When she laid her fingertips on Myka’s forearm, she felt what might have been a sharp exhalation, but nothing more.

            She tried to let the anticipation coiled in her body at this discovery go slack—clearly Myka didn’t want to discuss this, and it was late anyway. The best thing for it was to stop her advances and go to sleep. Even though the three small points of contact between their bodies was searing Helena’s skin, she coached herself into breathing steadily, keeping her eyes closed and relaxing her muscles one by one.

            Just before she finally fell asleep, with the morning light starting to creep through the hotel curtains, she felt, or dreamt that she felt, the fingers against her wrist lift up and stroke her hair.

 

 

            The fourth victim wasn’t part of the cast or crew, wasn’t related to them, and had just arrived the day before she started starving—she hadn’t been to any of the museums or historical sites, only to the pageant. It was a frustrating clue, both narrowing and widening the search. Helena and Myka checked in on the other victims at the hospital, circled back to the cast and crew, and then started examining the set itself, from the enormous risers on the tiered stage to the bottoms of the chairs the audience sat in, starting at the approximate place the fourth victim had sat. Finally they saw something they hadn’t seen before: a security guard.

            “Ladies, I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” he said. “If you’re here for the pageant, you can come back in an hour.”

            Myka scrutinized the man, and Helena watched out of the corner of her eye as her partner’s beautiful mind worked.

            “Do you have a lot of security problems here?” Myka asked after introducing herself.

            “No ma’am, it’s mostly just people arguing over seats or trying to touch the set. People can’t have a religious experience these days without rubbing their hands all over it.”

            Myka showed him a picture of the fourth victim. “Did you notice this woman rubbing her hands on anything last night?”

            “Yeah, she touched a wagon. Have to put a stop to that, ‘cause last year someone ripped a hole in the canvas trying to cut out a souvenir. Crazy, selfish—”

            “Which wagon?”

            He showed them, and Helena and Myka stood shoulder to shoulder, discussing quietly.

            “It can’t be the whole wagon, or there’d be dozens more people falling ill.”

            “And the costumer wouldn’t have anything to do with it at all, unless…”

            “The ripped canvas from last year would need to have been sewed.”

            Both of their gazes fell on the little square of canvas stitched onto the rest of the wagon cover.

            “The patch.”

            “Has to be.”

            Much to the security guard’s distress, Helena pulled out a pair of gloves and a spring-loaded pocketknife and started ripping out stitches while Myka held a bag open for her. The patch sparked, only a faint sizzle above the noise of the arriving audience. A trip to the hospital confirmed that the victim’s hunger had finally begun to be sated.

 

           

            Late as it was, their flight home had to be put off until morning. One more night in their shared bed.

            They read together for a while in companionable silence. It was hard for Helena to put aside the vision of the night before, how close the two of them had been, how real it had seemed. She watched Myka out of the corner of her eye, and it struck her that perhaps Myka had her doubts, too. Helena had taken advantage of her friendship before, and she had lost someone dear to her already, and Helena could be dreadfully flirtatious, and… and what if they were both advancing and retreating, waiting for a definite sign before charging forward?

            Helena had her book propped up on her knees, and she shifted it over so she could extend one leg, dragging it along Myka’s. A shivering breath and the flutter of a book being closed met her ears. She glanced over as she started to bring her leg back up, pressing her foot against Myka’s calf. Eyes closed, breathing a little heavily, Myka was still fast as lightening, clamping her hand down on Helena’s thigh to keep her still.

            She turned to Helena and asked a question Helena recognized, the pivotal question of Myka’s stated life philosophy. “What do you want this to mean?”

            “Whatever you prefer. I-I should probably confess, however, that I do love you.”

            The words tumbled into the still air between them so easily that Helena couldn’t believe it was the first time she’d said them aloud.

            She was desperate to say them again, almost as much so as she was to meet Myka’s lips as she leaned toward Helena. They kissed like they were waking up from a dream, slowly, careful not to find themselves flung too suddenly into reality. But this was reality, and each renewed kiss after breaking away cemented that in Helena’s mind. She ran her hand up Myka’s arm, held her close by the back of her neck like she’d wanted to the night before, and Myka moved closer to her in the bed until they were pressed together, a welcome advance. Even as their momentum slowed, they stayed near, brushing their noses together, breathing the same air.

            “I’ve slept like five hours in the last two days, having you in bed with me,” Myka confessed.

            Helena chuckled. “You didn’t ask about a roll-away again last night, though.”

            Myka shrugged, then snuggled almost aggressively into the bed, pulling Helena down with her. An arm around Helena’s waist and a leg across her hips both curled tight and pulled her close. Helena struggled to reach the bedside lamp and turn it off in Myka’s grip.

            “I love you, too,” Myka whispered in her ear before laying her head on Helena’s shoulder. “Sleep well.”

 

 

                       


End file.
